The Texas Republican Party gave its final nod to a party platform endorsing so-called gay conversion therapy, which seeks to turn homosexuals straight. They also moved to scrub decades-old language claiming "homosexuality tears at the fabric of society."

The new policy on “reparative therapy” was
ushered through Saturday without debate at the annual Texas GOP
convention held this year in Fort Worth. All in all, 7,000
delegates turned up to endorse a Tea Party-inspired party
platform pushing Texas Republicans farther to the right on a raft
of social and policy issues.

Under the new platform, the Texas GOP now recognizes "the
legitimacy and efficacy of counseling, which offers reparative
therapy and treatment for those patients seeking healing and
wholeness from their homosexual lifestyle."

The therapy language was included at the request of Cathie Adams
of Dallas, leader of the influential Tea Party group Texas Eagle
Forum and a onetime chairwoman of the Texas Republican Party, AP
reported.

Adams, whose group rallied behind Tea Party candidates who
dominated Texas Republican primary races this year, claimed she
was only promoting a proposal which had been endorsed by a man
who underwent the therapy.

"He knows what he's talking about. He is one of those who has
benefited," Adams said. "I think the majority of Texans
feel that way too. It's not like this is mandatory. This is only
a voluntary program.”

The party did in fact temper its stance in one regard, removing a
decades-old section from the party’s platform which said: “We
affirm that the practice of homosexuality tears at the fabric of
society and contributes to the breakdown of the family unit.
Homosexual behavior is contrary to the fundamental, unchanging
truths that have been ordained by God.”

According to the Houston Chronicle, this change was met with some
resistance on Thursday, with at least one delegate demanding the
committee return to the platform language about homosexuality
tearing at the fabric of society.

The Texas GOP is believed to be countering recent moves
countering bans on conversion therapy targeting teens which have
recently been introduced in New Jersey and California. In August,
the Republican governor of New Jersey, Chris Christie, signed
into a law a bill banning licensed therapists from attempting to
turn gay teens straight.

Judges on a federal appeals court also upheld a similar ban in
California last fall, arguing that trying to change a minor's
sexual orientation through intense therapy appeared dangerous.

This opinion lines up with major health and psychological
organizations. In 2012, the Pan American Health Organization
(the combined North and South American chapter of the World
Health Organization) warned against services claiming to
“cure” people with non-heterosexual sexual orientations
as they lack medical justification and represent a serious threat
to the health and well-being of affected people.

The American Medical Association, the American Psychiatric
Association, the American Psychological Association, the American
Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, the American
Counseling Association, the National Association of Social
Workers, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the National
Association of School Psychologists, and the American Academy of
Physician Assistants have all been critical of conversion
therapy.

Apart from the issue of homosexual conversion, the Texas
Republican Party platform draft also supports “total
constitutional rights for the unborn child,” backs
“eliminating bureaucratic prohibitions on corporal discipline
and home schooling in foster homes," and calls for “the
United States House of Representatives to appoint a select
committee and a special prosecutor in order to subpoena testimony
to fully investigate all aspects of the Benghazi debacle.”

Meanwhile, a recent Washington Post-ABC News poll found that half
of Americans believe same-sex marriage is a
constitutionally-protected right. Fifty percent agree the Equal
Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment grants marriage rights to
same-sex couples, while 56 percent personally believe gays and
lesbians have a right to get married. In contrast, 43 percent
said same-sex marriage is not constitutionally protected, while
38 percent oppose it on grounds of personal belief.

Some conservatives in Texas believe rallying behind such causes
will only serve to alienate younger voters, 70 percent of whom
support same-sex marriage, according to a 2013 Pew Poll.

"There's a very, very small group of people who want to keep
the party in the past. We were here today to try to pull the
party into the future," Rudy Oeftering, vice president of
the gay conservative group Metroplex Republicans, told AP.
"The only way the party can go into the future is to start
listening to young people, to start listening to people who have
gay family members."